The Henrietta Barnett School

CT taught Drama at this school and I took GCSE in her subject. The class was sub-divided into groups of 5-7 pupils and we used to put on short plays in this smaller group.

One day, a girl who had been in my group for several terms arrived to class, only to go and start working with another group. When we asked her why, she wouldn't respond. We waited until the end of the class to ask CT about this. CT responded that she had received a complaint about the group having mistreated this girl. When pressed, she admitted the complaint had come from the girl's parent.

What had happened in reality (and what CT did not bother to find out) was that this girl had never, ever, ever contributed to any of the work, simply standing there and expecting others to plan the whole play for her. Naturally, and since no one wanted to do her GCSE as well as their own, she was asked quite a few times what her suggestions were and if she had any contributions to make.

It appears that this concept of collaborative teamwork was totally and devastatingly destabilising for her.

Having then taken this grave abuse to her parent, the parent too had deemed their child being expected to work together with others as a team to be totally unacceptable.

Did CT bother to cross-check this parent's lies with others who had been involved in order to get to the truth of the matter? Nope. She took the parent's word for it, without investigation, accepting parental advocacy on behalf of one pupil, and then deciding, without asking any other pupil in the group (let alone their parents, who would obviously have been horrified to discover that a parent had been telling lies about their children, and would have wanted to advocate for their own children), what had taken place. Off the back of that, she had advised this girl to move group and to stare straight through her friends when asked why. When we explained the truth to CT, she stood there stony-faced and immovable.

CT's attitude was cold and calculating. A truly unprofessional woman, who displayed during this incident her woeful lack of competence.

Frankly, this incident really betrayed the biases of the teachers in this school. I will never forget CT coldly pronouncing the unexamined "truth" of what had happened.

Truth? Why would the truth matter when you have an pre-planned agenda to sustain? That parent could have said anything. CT would have taken any pack of lies at face value.

So, if you are planning to send your child to this school, be aware that they may be casually blamed and victimised by CT, who allows individual parents to dictate what goes on in the classroom and forms views on particular pupils based on her own narrow minded, biased, preconceived ideas of who must be "right" or "wrong" in a given situation.

Let me put it another way. She took one look at me, didn't like what she saw (and I don't have to think too deeply to imagine why that might have been) and immediately, unquestioningly assumed the worst.

Also, be aware that if you decide to take Drama, there will be individuals who do nothing to contribute towards your group's work, only for the "teacher" to rally round this negligence and laziness and berate others for expecting everyone to do their fair share of the work. Be prepared to do two people's work instead of one; and if you aren't prepared to shoulder this burden so that someone else can spend the whole lesson relaxing, expect to be treated like filth by CT.

Off the back of my experience with CT, I would not recommend this school to anyone. If you make the mistake of choosing this school, expect to be made to feel very miserable by the biased culture of blame that was in evidence during this incident. If your face or personality doesn't fit, you are the culprit in every situation.

As a student in this school, I feel that this school is safe and a good environment. However I also feel that there are it’s own set of disadvantages as well.

Firstly, I’d like to note the fact that students are such overachievers and produce such high results that teaches usually end up putting too much pressure and work on them. Some teachers don’t care about our well-being and also threaten and intimidate students.

I feel that the students in the school are very clever but the school itself is not. The school often tells us that they care about us but I feel that they do not. Teachers have said multiple times straight to my face that my opinion does not change anything that they do. I feel that the school claims to recognise our concerns but instead pressurises us to not make complaints but making a huge deal about it whenever we try to speak out. And example of this would be dragging students to counselling without their consent. Almost as if they feel like counselling is going to solve all our problems when clearly it is them that is causing it.

I want to emphasise the fact that the school does not take care of our well-being enough and they do not provide effective ways for students to feel less pressurised. Of course the school does try to but it all feels like a facade that’s just useless. I feel that the students forget that their health and happiness is their top priority rather than grades and it’s okay to prioritise that.

Our school is very big and pretty but also underfunded. Sports are probably worse than the average school. Music facilities are relatively good. The academics in the school are obviously exceptional.

In conclusion if you feel that you are struggling with your studies then I do not recommend you come to the school because the school does not teach you the basics and instead focuses on more in-depth education. The teachers here assume you know everything and you basically need to learn everything yourself. If you want to challenge yourself then I advise you to go for it. There is no right or wrong answer.